Needing

// Alexa McMahon

For one full year, our mother did not change
your sheets. The beds came paired,

twins; though you were younger. At night,
I lay awake in the quilted mirror of the place

you died. Would pull back your comforter
and find the tiniest stem of a grape you ate,

your smell, like raw dough,
ever weaker. I pulled the covers back tight

to keep you in.

A year to the night,

I walked up our parents’ street
to a house that belonged

to your memory. The street lamps
orange as planets in a line, extending

far beyond the silhouetted stairs. By the door
I smelled it, the creamy tang of yeast

that meant a neighbor baking bread.
I imagined it, young and warm,
growing in the bowl.